New operator request: String concatenation

[raja99]

Hi Brandon. Is there any chance we could get a string concatenation operator? In other words, I’d like to be able to enter a name as (e.g.) “Clarke” in one field, “Arthur C. ” in another, and be able to display it as “Arthur C. Clarke”.

I want to do this so I can easily sort by last name first (sort by last name field then by first name field) but display the results in a more human-friendly form. This would also make it easy to properly sort book titles; e.g., “The Wind from the Sun” should be in the Ws and not in the Ts.

Or is there some easier way to do what I’m thinking of?

Thanks!

—

Raja Thiagarajan

[Brendan]

Hello Raja,

Well, I added the ability to specify up to 5 fields on the list view, so you can certainly do your sorting by last name then first name quite easily. Except it will display the fields on top of each other which I know isn’t what you want. My calculation field code right now only supports numeric values and not text values. But it’s something that would be nice to have in a future update.

Thanks,

Brendan

[Kurtois]

I would like to see this feature added, as well.

For now, I am curious if there is some possibility of a workaround with, perhaps, Keyboard Maestro, or some other software.

[dom]

+1
Brendan,
This is something I asked for months ago!

[Eric W]

I also would like to see text calculations (similar to the text functions in Excel, for example). Additionally, the numerical calculations should be significantly improved also (financial, scientific, algebraic and boolean functions).

Eric

[Brendan]

Improvements to the Calculation field are coming for the next update, including string concatenation.

So you’ll be able to do something like:

[First Name] + ” ” + [Last Name] + ” owes $” + [Price] * [Quantity] + ” to pay the bill”.

The result would be:

Eric W owes $8.99 to pay the bill

Thanks!

Brendan

[Joe Huether]

Thank you Brendan,
Am looking forward to the great updates.

[Brendan]

Hi Joe,

This string concatenation feature is already in the existing version of Tap Forms. This is an old thread.

Thanks

Brendan

[Joe Huether]

Brandon,
Thanks for the calculation field text/string function.
Concatenation works with multiple text fields (FirstLast = First + ” ” + Last), but if I try to calculate using another calculated/concatenated text string (FirstLastOther = FirstLast + ” & ” + Other) it comes up blank.
Using all three text fields in the one calculation works ok. Am I pushing the capability? Thanks, Joe

[1Levite]

iMAC, OSX Yosemite, TF3.5.3

I gave Joe’s concatenation of string concatenations observation a try and got some interesting results:

T1 field as text
T2 field as text
T1T2 field as calculation with formula concatenated T1+T2 as Text
T1T2Other field as calculation with formula concatenated T1+T2+”TapForms” as Text

Let T1 = “One”
Let T2 = “Three”
Then T1T2 = “OneThree”; T1T2Other is blank.

Let T1 = “1”
Let T2 = “3”
Then T1T2 = “13”; T1T2Other is “13TapForms”

So….it looks like string concatenations using concatenated fields work only if the text strings T1, T2 and T1T2 happen to be digits (including decimal form). But not if the text strings happen to be letters.

This doesn’t solve Joe’s issue, but I thought it was interesting.

1Levite

[Brendan]

Hi Joe,

Hmm… Using a Calculation field with a Text Result Type within another Text based Calculation field is something I haven’t tried before. I’ll have to do some playing around with that.

Thanks,

Brendan

[1Levite]

Dang it! Seems that I always make a little error on these postings. Correction on definition of T1T2Other field definition. If there’s a way to edit replies in the Forum, I haven’t figured it out. So you get a corrected entire entry. Sorry
————————————

iMAC, OSX Yosemite, TF3.5.3

I gave Joe’s concatenation of string concatenations observation a try and got some interesting results:

T1 field as text
T2 field as text
T1T2 field as calculation with formula concatenated T1+T2 as Text
T1T2Other field as calculation with formula concatenated T1T2+”TapForms” as Text

Let T1 = “One”
Let T2 = “Three”
Then T1T2 = “OneThree”; T1T2Other is blank.

Let T1 = “1”
Let T2 = “3”
Then T1T2 = “13”; T1T2Other is “13TapForms”

So….it looks like string concatenations using concatenated fields work only if the text strings T1, T2 and T1T2 happen to be digits (including decimal form). But not if the text strings happen to be letters.

This doesn’t solve Joe’s issue, but I thought it was interesting.

1Levite

[Leo]

Brendan,

is concatenated text already implemented in the calculation field? I can’t find it or get it right.

Leo

[Brendan]

Hi Leo,

Yes it is.

You have to set the Return Type to “Text” on your Calculation field. And then make a formula like this:

[First Name] + ” ” + [Last Name] + ” owes $” + [Price] * [Quantity] + ” to pay the bill”.

What version of Tap Forms are you using?

Thanks,

Brendan

[Leo]

Brendan,

version 3.5.3 (Mac)

I found it now. Didn’t notice the result option in de calculation field. I was looking at the wrong show as option.

thanks, Leo

[Author]

Posts